I would like to take a minute to mention what SupCom1 did right about patrols and what I hope can be added to PA to make them even better. The big thing is patrols as rally points. It is really useful to be able to have your units immediately get to work straight out of the factory, instead of stacking up in front of them waiting for orders. It has saved my *** a ton of times when things have gotten bad. There are a few things I think could be improve about how this is handled, though. It would be handy to be able to link together a few factories rally points and instruct them, for example, "when you have 1 large ship, 3 medium ships, and 2 of each of these small ships (from any combination of these factories), then set off on a group patrol as a unit. Any extras, wait here for the next full group". This would allow for the fielding of cohesive patrols, instead of the piecemeal unit-by-unit patrols we could do before. Hand in hand, it would also be useful to be able to tell them how far apart to space themselves, so you don't end up with all of them patrolling right next to each other due to coincidences of build timing and route size. Gathering up units on patrols is also a little tricky sometimes. You have to try and get all of them together from disparate locations, which can sometimes take you away from primary command at just the wrong time. It would be nice to be able to select a ROUTE, and issue commands to all or some of the units on the route without having to scroll all over the map. Also, it would be nice to be able to tell specific groups to shift to new routes (both shift to already established routes, or to create new ones) while others could stay on the old ones. In other words, selection based on who is currently patrolling on a route, instead of having to hunt down individual pickets. These improvements would allow for greater strategic control and usefulness out of patrols, and make managing large forces easier in general.
